I delight in running all levels of Dungeons & Dragons. You can always throw exciting challenges at the party, and they can always surprise you with their solutions. I find nothing better than setting a challenge without knowing how to overcome it and watching the players invent something in front of my eyes.

As the DM, you are the interpreter of the adventure environment. Use your knowledge of the critical elements to extrapolate where additional features are.

One piece of advice I detest is this: “Move a clue to where the players can find it.” Instead, if the players do an excellent job of investigating in a place where they could reasonably expect to find a clue, and you forgot to put one there, then extrapolate from the scenario’s parameters and determine what they discover.

Any scenario – whether one you design or prewritten by another – covers the most likely topics in the eyes of the designer. But the glory of TTRPGs is that the referee can add additional details. It’s best when they aren’t arbitrary but follow logically.

In one session, the players cast speak with animals. Suddenly, they were interrogating the dogs which had attacked the criminals. Not something I’d thought of when I did the design, but I knew the criminals used mind magic to eliminate memories. But the scenario also had dogs disappearing from a neighbourhood. So the dogs *could* tell them about that. (I described the howling of the dogs at night as the “dog telegraph” and how the dogs’ voices had gone silent in that neighbourhood).

That’s the extrapolation from the parameters of the scenario. I don’t want to say, “You take the exact actions I laid out, so you fail,” but instead to reward intelligent and innovative play.

It took me time to learn these techniques. I ran many sessions where they failed if the players didn’t do what adventure assumed they’d do. But I’ve gotten better at improvising from the material.

Exploration of the Forgotten City

Tonight’s session saw the party (of 17th and 18th level characters) reach the Forgotten City, the lost capital of the Suel Empire, in the Sea of Dust. I described how there were three notable buildings – all else utterly ruined – and how smoke issued from one.

The party were there seeking the seventh segment of the Rod of Seven Parts. As far as they knew, no one lived here in the desiccated wasteland.

At this point, I didn’t know what they would do. The characters sent the barbarian to scout. (Amusing fact: he is the only one with good stealth and the worst Perception). He discovered a band of 20 warriors serving the evil demigod Iuz in the building from which smoke issued.

Now, what would you do? Bypass the warriors? Attack them? Try to trick them? The game is Dungeons & Dragons. You could try any of those things, or even more besides!

My party took the obvious option: They attacked. The foes were CR 5 gladiators, and the fight took 90 minutes or so to resolve, I think. This was one of those fights where the players weren’t constrained. Their foes had no immunities or resistances. The party could do what they wanted and cast many spells. However, as each gladiator had 112 hit points, they took some time to get through. The cleric took full advantage of his wings of flight to keep out of harm’s way and harass the foes. At one point, he used reverse gravity to keep six of the gladiators out of the fight.

Both the wizard and cleric used several area effect spells to damage multiple enemies at once. They could shine in this battle. The fighter and barbarian were less effective but still crucial, as they tied up the foes and allowed the spellcasters to stay free of melee.

The Return of Zig

By the end of the combat, the players captured a Warrior of Iuz taken out of the fight by reverse gravity and interrogated him. They learned that the warriors had accompanied a powerful servant of Iuz: Zig.

I then revealed to the players that Zig was the patron who had hired the characters at the beginning of the campaign. Zig wanted the party to recover some scrolls from Castle Greyhawk. The players betrayed him, which led to him manoeuvring the city council to have them exiled. That all led to the sequence of events that shaped the campaign. I had intended to run a Castle Greyhawk campaign. Instead, it became a campaign in Furyondy and Veluna, with Iuz annoyed at them and other threats coming into play.

The end of the campaign is tied back to the beginning. I expect Zig to find the seventh part of the Rod, so they’ll have to defeat him. (And he’ll reveal everything that he did to discredit them.)

Now the party have defeated the Warriors and learnt that Zig is exploring the catacombs below. What would you do next?

My group has chosen to go to a place of safety and rest since they expended most of their high-level spells fighting the warriors. Of course, this then gives Zig more time to find the Rod!

Choices in the Game

Freedom in actions choice and consequences based on those actions are important to me. Consider what might have happened if the party had gone immediately into the catacombs or if they’d bypassed the warriors first. If they’d avoided the warriors, does that mean that Zig might leave the catacombs and employ the warriors to trap the party within them?

Incidentally, I didn’t do the calculation on “Twenty challenge 5 monsters”. I just guessed that it might be challenging. It could have been, it might not have been. If the foes were too difficult, the party could retreat or sneak past the enemies. Too easy a fight, then onwards!

You don’t always need to know the party’s strength relative to monsters. If the party has more options than “get into a fight” – and opportunities to retreat if they fight and then realise it’s too hard – you’re all good.